DIY Recovered Ottoman

Today, I'm sharing a little re-upholstery project to update an much-abused ottoman.

I've had this one finished for quite awhile but haven't shared it because I was hoping to find a good "before" image - but this is the only one I could come up with...

It doesn't look so bad here, but fast forward a few years, and the brown microfiber fabric was stained and worn. Not pretty. I'm still kicking myself for not taking a "before" photo, but this is one of those projects that just took over and before I knew it, I was done.

The ottoman matches the little brown couch in the photo and lifts up for storage. We love having it, but after we got a new grey couch and loveseat for the family room, the ottoman didn't quite match - and it was extremely ugly. I had a chunk of blue corduroy fabric in my stash that was sturdy and practical - and I had a matching blue polka-dot fabric to recover the new pillows to build a grey / blue theme. (And I have yet to start that last part to date - oh well...)

So, staple gun in hand, I went to work recovering the ottoman. I unscrewed the top lid and recovered it first, folding and stapling the fabric in place, making sure to punch holes where the screws needed to put back in.

I didn't even bother taking the old fabric off - I think it would have been almost impossible (and maybe I've mentioned this before, but I'm a little impatient).

I stapled the fabric around the bottom sides of the ottoman next.

And before I knew it - I was ready to attach the top back to the base.

It looked so much better...

...as long as you ignore the un-recovered pillows (not a fan of that purple fabric that originally came on the pillows - I'm hoping to get those recovered soon).

We are super happy with the change - we've extended the lift of our tired little ottoman. I think it's a lot happier now too...

Sharing at these great parties:

      

May 2012 Crafty Round-Up

I've been doing monthly round-ups for 2012, based on the class Kate Nelson taught at Big Picture Classes. I thought it would be fun to do a craft project round-up too, here on this blog. You can see the one I did for our family blog here.

For projects around the house, I made drop-cloth curtains to replace the vertical blinds in the dining room.

Byron put in a new bathroom faucet in the powder room. Love how it completes the room after the makeover it got earlier this year.

I painted the front door inside and out. What a difference. Love it even though this paint job made me cry at least 3 times (that's not an exaggeration - I'm terrible at painting).

I'm really proud of myself for staining the deck all by myself. When we moved in last year, I knew the deck was going to need to be tackled at some point. It had been neglected for a few years by the look of it, and was pretty sorry and grey. I kind of got a wild hair one day and thought I should just stain it before I chickened out. It was not easy, but I'm super happy it's done. It's now a nice dark brown.

And best of all, We had the master bedroom, bathroom, and closet painted. Here's how the bedroom looked when we moved in:

Crazy, right? What is up with those black stripes? It's so very-1995, even though this house was built in 2005. And those black stripes are textured with some kind of plaster, so I was kinda thinking it would be impossible to paint over them. And then, we had a very plain white bathroom (don't even get me started on the very weird tub-in-the-floor):

 The thought of painting these rooms by myself was daunting to say the least - especially since, as I mentioned before, I have cried at much lesser paint jobs. Instead, we splurged and hired an awesome painter. He was able to paint all three spaces in 2 days. It looks AH-MAZ-ING.

 

Bye-bye black stripes...so much better. I am so happy every time I walk into our bedroom now. The bedroom color is Proper Gray from Sherwin-Williams. And the bathroom is Respite, also from Sherwin-Williams.

 

So nice and bright and lovely. Both rooms still need lots of sprucing up, but it's so wonderful to have the painting all finished. I keep hoping I'll run into Matt Muenster while I'm shopping at Lowe's some weekend and end up with a bathroom makeover. Sigh.

Mmmmm....Matt....

That's it for home decor - that's quite a lot for a month, even if 1 of those projects I hired out.

For scrapbooking in May, I created 7 scrapbook layouts this month - 5 paper...

 

 ...and 2 digital...

That first layout was from a tutorial at Jessica Sprague's Photoshop Friday. Love those weekly lessons!

And finally, I started playing around with Lightroom print templates and created one to share with you all via download. I hope you enjoy it - and I'm hoping to make more soon.

That's it for May - a busy month. June is already underway, and I know I'll have more projects to share soon.

Drop-Cloth Curtains

I've seen lots of curtain treatments to replace vertical blinds, but my favorite has been the drop-cloth curtains. I especially loved these from A Soft Place to Land. They were my inspiration when I created my own version of drop-cloth curtains.

When we moved in last year, I knew right away that I would want to do something to replace the vertical blinds. They were noisy, they were bland, they were broken in a couple of places. Not good.


  
Now, they've been replaced with a simple curtain that I love. They are easy to open and close, and they let a bit of light shine through without being see-through.

Drop-cloth curtains are possibly the easiest window treatment. You just buy a drop-cloth, cut it to width (if necessary), then use clips to hang it from the rod, adjusting the length as needed. I added a fabric border to the top to give it a bit more length - and a border at the bottom for a bit more color.

To create the curtains, I used:

• 1 drop-cloth ($15 for a 4x15ft cloth), cut in 1 / 2 to create 2 panels
• 2 yards of fabric for the border ($10)
• Curtain rod ($20)
• Curtain clips ($15)

Total cost: $60

Not bad at all for a window treatment that completely transforms our dining room from a dreaded eyesore into a space I love.

If you have vertical blinds that you want to replace, try making your own drop-cloth curtains. They are super easy - and they look amazing.

Sharing at these lovely parties: